Study objective-The level of material deprivation or affluence is strongly and independently correlated with all cause mortality at an area level, but educational attainment, after controlling for deprivation-affluence, remains strongly associated with coronary and infant mortality.

This study investigated whether these relations hold at an individual level with self reported morbidity.

Design-Analysis of the cross sectional associations of self reported longstanding illness and « not good » or « fairly good » self assessed health with individual educational attainment in seven levels, adjusting for deprivation measures (economic status of head of household, car ownership, housing tenure, overcrowding).

Setting-The 1993 General Household Survey, a random sample of households in Great Britain.

Participants-11 634 subjects aged 22 to 69.

Main results-After adjusting for household deprivation, lower educational attainment was significantly associated with longstanding illness in men (odds ratio 1.05 per education category, 95% CI 1.02 to 1.08), but not in women (odds ratio 1.01,95% CI 0.98 to 1.04).

The associations with « not good » or « fairly good » self assessed health were stronger and significant in both men and women (men 1.13,95% CI 1.10 to 1.17 ; women 1.10,95% CI 1.07 to 1.14).

The findings were little changed by allowing for people in poor health becoming economically inactive. (...)